Wondering how some of our footballers are putting their Code’s ‘Respect and Responsibility’ policies into practice?

Curious as to whether all the effort that has gone into addressing sexual misconduct, harassment, indecent exposure, violence and other myriad manifestations of disrespect for women? (You’ll find some here)

Perhaps Hawthorn star Lance “Buddy” Franklin can help us answer these important questions?

Here’s some t.shirts he has designed – and is seen here proudly modeling – for his Nena and Pasadena brand.

Franklin is headless wearing in the t.shirts above. But of course it’s him.

A topless women, with her breast and nipple visible, has her head wrapped in a scarf. Perhaps that’s because her face – and her full humanity – don’t count that much. A headless woman, her butt cheeks glowing and emphasised. Because, again, no need to bother with her face. The man in the photo with her is not revealing his backside. They pretty much never do.

Another image depicts a topless woman covering her breast with her hand. ‘Angel of silence’ reads the slogan. The best kind of women right? They let their bodies do the talking and keen their mouths shut. This image features on billboards.

Up until a short time ago the same ‘Angel of Silence’ image was also the profile picture for Nena and Pasadena’s facebook page. It’s been replaced with a new one of Franklin in a t.shirt with a bearded man on it. That man has clothes on.

The AFL’s Respect and Responsibility Policy “represents the Australian Football League’s commitment to addressing violence against women and to work towards creating safe, supportive and inclusive environments for women and girls across the football industry as well as the broader community”.

In serious tones, the Code informs us that ”in March 2009, the AFL, in cooperation with State League/TAC Cup Clubs, commenced delivering a State League Respect and Responsibility Module. The aims of the Module are to:

• Promote safe and inclusive environments for women and girls at all levels of Australian Football and the wider community;

• Increase players understanding of how sexual assault, violence, harassment and abuse can affect the lives of women and girls;

• Provide practical information that assists players to understand the meaning of consent, and identify situations that have the potential to go wrong; and,

• Provide players with information that may assist them to build and maintain social relationships with women that are healthy and respectful.

I asked anti sexual violence campaigner Nina Funnell, who trains other elite sporting codes on their attitudes towards women, sex and consent, what impact she thought these t.shirts could have:

It is vital that sporting codes and individual athletes who undertake and commit to respectful relationship courses are consistent in their behavior. To superficially pay lip service to respecting women while simultaneously perpetuating attitudes or behaviors that either objectify or harm women is not only disingenuous and insincere, it is destructive as it undermines respect for women as a value. To send a confusing message on this topic is worse than sending no message at all.

AFL players are recognisable public figures. They get paid the big bucks for a reason and it is their responsibility to exercise due diligence in thinking through the issues and brands they endorse. Like other athletes and public figures, they must take responsibility for this. “

The t.shirts are a form of harassment. They normalise sexualised representations of women and send a message that women are merely ornaments and decorations whose sole role is to bare their flesh and gratify men. They erode efforts of the AFL to change the disrespectful attitudes of many of their players. And they make the work of women like Nina Funnell even harder.

Does Franklin share the patronizing and dismissive views of his business partner Tim Arandt who has been sending this reply to Collective Shout members who have voiced their complaint?

Thanks for your comments and views but we feel we know what young people want to wear so we choose to continue our design concepts in full. I have three teenage boys of my own and have discussed your email with them, they were humored by your thoughts and added that the 6 o’clock news contained far more adult contact than a tshirt!! If you feel that we degrade women or promote violence against women please further your emails to the editor of the herald sun.

So teenage boys are now the leading experts on understanding the nuances of how the repeated sexualisation of female bodies affects young women’s self esteem and experience of public space? They are the arbiters of cultural standards regarding young women? The same boys whose views are reflected in a recent White Ribbon foundation report which found that one in seven teen boys thinks it is permissible to hold a girl down and force her to have sex if she has flirted or ‘led the guy on’.

But back to Buddy Franklin. Interesting to see he weighed in on the St Kilda nude photo scandal.

“I know that the AFL puts in place things at a young age, as soon as you get drafted, where you’ve got to be smart enough to know what’s going on in your private life and not to do things that are going to get out in public.”

Maybe Lance buddy, you should have kept those t.shirts of yours in a cupboard.

Thank you for your article Melinda.
I couldn’t agree with you more.
Unfortunately, portraying sexualised/objectified and often degrading images
of women on mens t-shirts has become a fashion trend. And yes, even daggy
old Roger David (obviously desperate to update its image) joined in….and
there are many more!
Sexual harassment laws would forbid most of these images from being
displayed on an office wall.
These men become walking billboards and everyone else is held captive and
involuntarily exposed.
When there is so much violence and sexual abuse committed against women – it
is utterly incomprehensible why anyone would willingly want to perpetuate
objectification. Dehumanising women is the first step that allows for such
behaviour.
Some victims of sexual abuse have reported that these images act as
triggers. Buy why be considerate, when it’s all about mens fashion!
As the director of Kids Free 2B Kids, I am appalled by any retailer or
designer who participates in this so called ‘fashion’ trend.
A national buyer for a well known Australian wide ‘family friendly’ company
that sells this sort of t-shirt recently said to me: “well, don’t you think
that if a girl sees a guy walking along the street in one of these t-shirts,
she’ll know he’s the sort of guy to stay away from?”
Yeah – right, that’s some justification ..so these t-shirts are
preventative!!!
In Australia 1 in 3 – 5 females will experience some form of sexual abuse by
the time they are 18. And for boys it’s 1 in 5 – 7. Shocking statistics!
People need to wake up.
Where are the retailers who proactively say ‘We will not stock this crap
because we respect women’… Someone oughta be brave enough to give it a
try.
Keep up your great work Melinda.

When a man wearing a t-shirt like this walks down the street towards me, I feel sick and distressed. If he respects women so little that he thinks nothing of wearing the image of one of our bodies, sexually exposed and accompanied by an objectifying slogan, what does he think of me? What is he seeing as I walk past? He may not even look at me but still it is enough – I have been put in my place. I am angry and want to challenge him, but his act of aggression is too clear. A man who wears a shirt like that is not going to listen to me, let alone care about the impact it has had. I have been objectified and silenced, while doing nothing more than taking my toddler to the park.

On this particular example, on reading the media coverage devoted to the launch of Nena & Pasadena I found it really interesting how so much of the media coverage of the launch of the Nena & Pasadena range in 2010 focused on Buddy Franklin’s intent to use some of the profits from the line for charity work:

“Creating the label also meant he could donate some of the proceeds to his new foundation to help indigenous children get an education. ‘A couple of indigenous kids at Scotch College have helped with some of the T-shirt designs and some of the proceeds are being donated to the foundation,’ he said.” (Herald Sun 24/6/10)

That is just so many kinds of wrong. Attempting to involve schoolkids in the production of a line of tshirts which include sexually explicit images? Raising money for one of the communities in Australia worst devastated by pornography and violence against women by selling material which directly contributes to the problem?

I contacted Scotch College yesterday to clarify their links to Nena & Pasadena. Their response was that students had not been involved designing shirts nor had any funding eventuated, and that the school would not wish to align itself with any organisation involved in the sexualisation of women.

These educators have it right. Now if only more of their their alumni would follow suit.

Just wanted to say I too have teenage sons, and I sincerely doubt their responses to the tee shirts would be the same as Tim’s sons, if I was to show them, which I don’t intend to. I guess one factor could be the role modelling in the home. Thanks for raising this Melinda. I intend to speak up more when I see demeaning tee shirts like these in my local shops.

In my world, this sort of ‘tee’ is not cool. It advertises your disrespect for all your fellow humans, not just women.
When *I* see someone a a shirt similar to these, I just see another child that hasn’t grown up to realise that gender discrimination & objectification is so ’50s.

I know that sounds simplified, but these Tees remind me of those ’50s adverts for vacuum cleaners & kitchen appliances. Or the fashion of the ’70s where people wore those fantasy t-shirts with the half-clothed ‘Amazonish’ female warriors being protected by the Adonis in a lap-lap astride a dragon or some shit.

The raciest t-shirt I owned had a PVC cannabis head on it, or the other one, the T with the naked whales all over it.

Unfortunately, our society’s ideologies and Cultural Capital are manipulated by advertising and large corporations. The current and past belief is that this type of image is marketable (sex sells in its basal form). The best way we men can fight this is to just not buy the product & let the marketers know that we’re not interested in this tacky shit.

I know I’m rambling a little (!) but seriously, I can think of only one of the many men I know who would consider wearing a shirt like that, & he was raised in a pretty strange family environment.

Rest assured, there are many blokes who agree with your analysis of this tripe.

yes it is true that not every person who sees an image like this is going to go out and rape a woman, but what we DO know is that men who DO rape women use the culture that objectifies and sexualises women to justify their behavior to themselves. These sort of shits also contribute to a cultural backdrop whereby it is acceptable to scrutinize, judge and exploit women’s bodies.

I am tired of having to be the one to explain why these shirts are disgusting. I am tired of having to divert my children’s when we are out in public. And I am tired of being labelled a prude for recognizing exploitation when I see it.

To see young men wearing shirts with pornographic depictions of women, as a woman, I feel sick to my very core. I feel less comfortable, and less safe.

I got a response from my email to Tim Arandt. He wants me to answer truthfully (Why truthfully. Does he automatically expect people to reply with untruths) as to whether I’ve ever visited or commented on Collective Shout. Since he does not provide a reason for his question, I shall not bother to answer, since he has not determined why it is relevant to my comments about the t-shirt designs.

Caitlin, don’t ever feel the need to justify yourself by stating, “I am not a prude”. Objectification of women is simply wrong, regardless.

Brad, the cause to stop rampant capitalistic consumer products that seek new markets by claiming to be “edgy” needs more male voices.

One thing I do get tired of, and that is that it’s always women who do the speaking up. Studies show that male peer pressure is a strong influence, if more men responded with “this is not right” we can make a bigger impact.

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